David Dreier

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would like to simply say that again, we did not have a goal of offending Members on this. This is not about foreign policy, this is about commending our troops. Mr. Speaker, this resolution is 2\1/2\ pages long, okay. I am going to share with our colleagues the resolved clause. Resolved, That the House of Representatives (1) affirms that the United States and the world have been made safer with the removal of Saddam Hussein and his regime from power in Iraq; (2) commends the Iraqi people for their courage in the face of unspeakable oppression and brutality inflicted on them by Saddam Hussein's regime; (3) commends the Iraqi people on the adoption of Iraq's interim constitution; and (4) commends the members of the U.S. Armed Forces and coalition forces for liberating Iraq and expresses its gratitude for their valiant service. That is what this resolution is all about. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Myrick), the very distinguished Chair of the Republican Study Committee.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. It is true that the United States of America has had a bipartisan foreign policy. This resolution is not about foreign policy. This resolution is not about foreign policy, this is a resolution that is simply designed to congratulate our troops. I do not understand why there is any controversy on it. As I said earlier and as I said in the Committee on Rules last night, we are sorry if anyone was offended over the fact that Members of the minority were not offered a chance to have input. I said to a number of my colleagues, that is one of the reasons that we have in fact made in order a motion to recommit that will allow the minority at the end of the bill an opportunity to cast a vote on that. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) who has done a phenomenal job of focusing on the rights of women. She chairs our Republican Conference and the Subcommittee on Legislative and Budget Process Reform for the Committee on Rules.

Mr. DREIER. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, let me just say that I completely understand that he would like to have had input; and that is one of the reasons we, in fact, did provide an opportunity, which is unusual, in consideration of this rule, for a motion to recommit for Members of the minority, if in fact that was the case. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Atlanta, Georgia (Mr. Linder), my very good friend and the chairman of the Subcommittee on Technology and the House of the Committee on Rules.

Mr. DREIER. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute. I want to engage my colleague from Missouri in a colloquy. There is no Member of this House who is more highly regarded in the area of national security than our friend, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton). I am privileged to be a native of the Show Me State, and he has done us all very proud. I know at the end of the day he will want to support this resolution, Mr. Speaker, because this resolution does exactly, exactly what my friend just stated in his closing remarks: recognizing our troops. Now, we had no intention of offending anyone in drafting the resolution. In fact, we thought it was so noncontroversial that it would be an appropriate thing to move it forward.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend, the gentleman from Fort Lauderdale (Mr. Hastings) pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purposes of debate only. Mr. Speaker, 1 year ago, our brave servicemen and -women began a military operation that brought freedom for tens of millions, toppled one of the most despicable regimes in the history of the world, and strengthened the national security for the American people. Operation Iraqi Freedom was, and continues to be, a military success of the highest order. Within 4 weeks from the start of operations on March 19 of last year, the U.S. military had won unqualified victory. Saddam Hussein and his Baathist regime could no longer terrorize the Iraqi people who were finally free to act, do and say as they pleased for the first time in decades. Mr. Speaker, there is no question that Saddam Hussein endangered world security. He posed a threat to his people, his region and the international community. Trusting the intentions of a man who started two wars, gassed his own people, and supported international terrorism would have been grossly irresponsible. As weapons inspector David Kay has said, we know Saddam Hussein wanted weapons of mass destruction, we know he was attempting to resuscitate his illicit programs, and we know with certainty who he viewed his greatest enemy to be. In a world where Iran can buy its way to a nuclear program with assistance from Pakistan's top nuclear scientist, combined with Saddam's access to illicit oil revenue, the fact that weapons of mass destruction have not yet been found in Iraq is hardly proof that Saddam Hussein did not want to severely hurt our country. Moreover, American national security has been solidified by the military action that was undertaken last year. Mr. Speaker, does anyone really believe that Iran would be cooperating with international nuclear inspectors today if we had not launched this military operation? Does anyone really believe that North Korea would be engaged in six-party talks over the future of their nuclear program if the United States had not deposed Saddam Hussein? Does anyone really believe that Muammar Qaddafi, as recalcitrant in his defiance to the international community as ever a dictator has been, would have willingly come to the United States and Britain and declared that he wanted to end his illicit weapons programs had the American military not marched into Baghdad? Mr. Speaker, Operation Iraqi Freedom sent an unmistakable signal to the rest of the world's tyrannical leaders: Either play by the rules or face the consequences. Now, the events of September 11 taught us that we cannot allow threats to arrive on our shores before we combat them. If other Nations wish to keep their head in the sand about the dangers of proliferation and terrorism, that is their prerogative, but we cannot and could not afford to take that chance. To those who complain of the cost of war and its aftermath, I simply will note that estimates of the cost of containing Saddam and his successors, as some have argued we should have done, are upwards of six times the dollar amount we have spent on war and reconstruction thus far, and significantly higher in terms of human lives lost. Because of the heroic action of our military, the Iraqi threat has been mitigated efficiently and a new dawn has begun for the people of Iraq. Earlier this month, Iraqi leaders signed the transitional administrative law into effect. It establishes an Iraqi law, a bill of fundamental human rights and paves the way for Iraqi democracy. Perhaps more important than the signing of the law itself, was the agreement of Suni, Shiite, and Kurdish leaders to sign the document. While differences amongst them remain, and the road ahead will be difficult, it is clear they are acting with the best interests of the new Iraq and its people firmly in mind. I should say our colleague, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) is going to, in her remarks today, tell a very moving story about the fact that these very, very disparate groups have been able to come together sharing this pursued goal. The Iraqi people themselves are clearly enjoying their newfound freedoms under the transitional government. Poll results released just yesterday demonstrate that not only do a significant majority of Iraqis feel they are much better off than they were under Saddam Hussein's reign, but the extremely high level of participation in the poll demonstrates their desire to exercise their right to speak their minds, something that was unthinkable under the tyranny of Saddam Hussein. Such progress has only been possible because of the tireless commitment of our Armed Forces and those of the 34 nations assisting us to provide security on the ground in Iraq. It is dangerous territory; and the forces of evil, whether they be Ba'athist remnants or infiltrated al-Qaeda sympathizers, are a constant threat. In the past year, we have lost over 550 of our best and brightest Americans, with another 3,190 wounded. That number, as it is in any conflict, is too high. Without question, we owe the soldiers we have lost, the soldiers who remain, and their families, an enormous debt of gratitude. Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what this resolution marking this first anniversary is designed to do. If there is any solace, it is knowing that because of their actions, America and the world are safer places today with Saddam Hussein's regime dismantled. Because of our military, the people of Iraq have a bright future, where Sunni, Shiite, and Kurd alike can dream of being treated equally, of electing their representatives, of owning a prosperous business, and being free to say, worship, and read what they want. Mr. Speaker, it would be all too easy for the United States to leave Iraq now and let the Iraqi people fend for themselves. Avoiding conflict is the path of least resistance and is always politically expedient. But unlike previous conflict, terrorism cannot be contained. It has no boundaries. It has no rules. One day it strikes Baghdad, the next Madrid. The only recipe for success in this war is our resolve to defeat threats where we see them and promote democracy where we can. Mr. Speaker, true success in the war on terror is taking place right now on the ground in Baghdad and Kabul. By supporting, securing, and strengthening the democratic governments of Iraq and Afghanistan, we are promoting greater equality within those countries as well as providing forums for those who feel disaffected to air they grievances without picking up arms. As open and transparent governments spread throughout the world, the precursor ingredients for terrorism, anger, and fanaticism will dissipate. That will be the continuing legacy of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Mr. Speaker, I strongly support this rule and the underlying resolution, which not only affirms the actions that the United States undertook a year ago, but provides every Member of this body the opportunity to reaffirm their own personal commitment to winning the war against terrorism, our commitment to democracy in Iraq, and, most important, to our troops in the field. Mr. Speaker, it is my hope that this resolution will enjoy strong bipartisan support. That is our goal. I also hope, Mr. Speaker, that as soon as we pass this resolution that we will immediately have it translated in Arabic so that Saddam Hussein can read it in his cell and be reminded constantly of what we and the victims are regularly reminded of. Thanks to our military, Mr. Speaker, Saddam Hussein does have time to read that. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 561 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to address the House for 1 minute for the purpose of making an announcement. The Rules Committee may meet the week of March 15 to grant a rule which could limit the amendment process for floor consideration of H.R. 1375, the Financial Services Regulatory Relief Act of 2003. The Committee on Financial Services filed its report with the House on June 12, 2003, and the Committee on the Judiciary filed its report with the House on July 14, 2003. Any Member wishing to offer an amendment should submit 55 copies of the amendment and one copy of a brief explanation of the amendment to the Rules Committee in room H-312 of the Capitol by 10 a.m. on Wednesday, March 17. Members should draft their amendments to the text of the bill as reported on July 14, 2003. Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format. Members are also advised to check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, the answer is no, not at this moment. Let me say, if the gentleman would continue to yield, let me say that any Member had the opportunity last night to file an amendment.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern) if he would like to pose a question to me.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, would the gentleman yield for a question?

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, no. The gentlemen spoke for a nice long period of time. When I get done with my statement, I look forward to engaging with the gentleman. I never hesitate to do that. Let me say that, Mr. Speaker, I have to ask somewhat rhetorically, Was there a power surge last night or was it a full Moon? Someone has awakened the Franken-Food Monster. The amendments that have been filed last night appear to be nothing more than an all-out embrace of Ralph Naderism. Who has been in the sauce too much? Or maybe they need a little Hamburger Helper. Last night I thought that the minority was very serious when they said to us that they wanted to have an open amendment process for unlimited debate on this bill. I thought we were going to have a serious debate, a debate on how to stop the economically debilitating effect of frivolous lawsuits concerning obesity. But the amendments that were filed last night are making a mockery of what is a serious issue. Americans, Mr. Speaker, are eating themselves to death and looking for someone to blame. Obesity and weight control are very serious subjects, very, very serious subjects. I am reminded regularly by Arnold Schwarzenegger about that. And, of course, we have the great model of President Bush, who is probably the fittest President we have ever had. They talk about the fact that there are many factors to weight control and food consumption and health. And, obviously, fitness is numero uno, very, very important. Suing Burger King is not going to improve anyone's health. Personal responsibility and accountability are what are most important. We cannot have a serious debate, Mr. Speaker, on real issues, one about those who can use the court system for political purposes on whether it is right or wrong to force concessions or financial gain through legal harassment. We are clogging the judicial system with frivolous lawsuits, we are hurting business, we are putting American jobs in jeopardy, and at the same time we are clogging our arteries without considering the consequences. These are real issues that affect Americans' everyday lives. So I have to ask, Why are these frivolous amendments being filed by the minority? The majority is trying to govern and get the people's business done. And I must ask the minority why is there this fraudulent frolic of frivolous fluff. Is it intended to highlight frivolous lawsuits, or is it merely intended to change the subject? Let us get the people's work done, unburden businesses so they can create more jobs, and stop this bumper-sticker gamesmanship. I believe that we should withdraw the silliness and we should see those amendments, if they are offered, resoundly defeated.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, let me just say in responding to my friend from Massachusetts that this is clearly an open rule in the modern House that we have today. We are criticized over the fact that we have not been able move things; and then, Mr. Speaker, when we proceed with moving legislation forward, we do it under a procedure that does allow every single Member, every single Member who wants to offer a germane amendment the right to do that. That is exactly what this rule does.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. (during the Special Order of Mr. Hoekstra) Madam Speaker, the Committee on Rules may meet the week of March 8 to grant a rule which could limit the amendment process for floor consideration of H.R. 3717, the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act of 2004. The Committee on Energy and Commerce ordered the bill reported yesterday, March 3, 2004, and is expected to file its report in the House on Tuesday, March 9, 2004. Any Member wishing to offer an amendment should submit 55 copies of the amendment and one copy of a brief explanation of the amendment to the Committee on Rules in Room H-312 of the Capitol by 10 a.m. on Wednesday, March 10. Members should draft their amendments to the text of the bill as reported by the Committee on Energy and Commerce which will be available tomorrow for their review on the Web sites of both the Committee on Energy and Commerce and the Committee on Rules. Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format. Members are also advised to check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain that their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Madam Speaker, I rise to join my colleagues in honoring the life and career of Willie Shoemaker, arguably the most successful jockey in the history of horse racing. Willie Shoemaker, also known as the ``Shoe'', had a storied career, beginning at age 18, and continuing on for 41 amazing years. In that time he compiled 8,833 victories, including four Kentucky Derbies, five Belmont Stakes, and three Preakness Stakes. It was in my district, at Arcadia's Santa Anita park, that Willie Shoemaker was truly at home, and where he so often made history. There, on March 3, 1985, while riding Lord at War at the Santa Antia Handicap, he became the first jockey to total $100,000,000 in purse winning. On February 3, 1990, Santa Anita hosted the final race of his long career, after which Shoemaker went on to become a trainer. Tragically, Shoemaker was critically injured in an auto accident just over 1 year after his retirement. But though paralyzed from the neck down and confined to a wheelchair, he refused to give up his love for horses. Just 6 months after his accident, Willie was back at Santa Anita, where he supervised training activities. When Willie Shoemaker passed away at his San Marino home on October 13, 2003, at the age of 72, the world lost a true sporting legend and an exemplary human being. I therefore urge my colleagues to join with me in remembering and honoring his life and legendary career.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I offer a resolution (H. Res. 539) and ask unanimous consent for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, the Committee on Rules may meet next week to grant a rule for consideration of H.R. 3752, Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004 which may require that amendments be printed in the Congressional Record prior to their consideration on the floor. The Committee on Science ordered the bill reported on February 4, 2004, without amendment and is expected to file its report with the House on Monday, March 1, 2004. Members should draft their amendments to the text of the bill as introduced on February 3, 2004, by the Committee on Science. Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format. Members are also advised to check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain that their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I do not normally use this forum of Special Orders to address our colleagues, but tonight I want to spend some time talking about a very important issue. I want to talk about hamburger- flipping jobs. Actually, I want to talk about the claim made by some politicians and pundits that the American economy is turning into an economy of hamburger-flipping jobs. Now, we all know that hamburger-flipping jobs is a buzzword. It is a phrase intended to sum up a lot of complex changes that are going on in the American economy. Obviously those changes are impacting jobs. They are impacting businesses, they are impacting families, and they are impacting communities. Talking about hamburger-flipping jobs is a way to say that our economy is in decline. It says we are losing, quote/ unquote, good jobs, and in their place we are creating bad jobs, second-rate jobs, no-future jobs. Sometimes the same people talk about dishwashing jobs, or janitor jobs, or retail jobs, especially at Wal-Mart or Target or K-Mart. People use buzzwords because they reduce complicated ideas to a simple digestible package, and in this case we are talking about a whole host of very complex economic trends. It is no surprise that people turn to buzzwords. We no longer have to worry about viewers nodding off to sleep during long-winded speeches. They have 200 cable channels from which to choose, and obviously the unlimited Internet, so they can clearly move on for seconds. But, Mr. Speaker, I hope that our colleagues will bear with me as I go through this, because I think it is absolutely critical to dispel the utterly ridiculous, factually inaccurate, completely fictitious assertion that the American economy is heading downhill and that we are replacing good jobs with hamburger-flipping jobs. Exposing the charade of the hamburger-flipping jobs argument is absolutely critical, because these buzzwords are at the heart of a concerted attack on the fundamental basis, Mr. Speaker, of our economic strength, an attack on the fundamental basis of America's economic strength. There are serious people who want to turn back the clock on our economy, threatening very real gains that have been made by millions and millions of American families. Now, it is buzzword time again, Mr. Speaker. Talking about hamburger- flipping jobs is a way to demean our, quote/unquote, service economy. What do we mean by service economy? We do have an economy that is increasingly based on services, that is true. That means jobs that serve people, serving people well, customers, clients, taxpayers, patients and students. This new service economy is, I believe, a good thing. But as I have said, this is a very complicated subject. It is big. When we talk about the U.S. economy today, we are talking about an $11 trillion economy, and that is just in 1 year, Mr. Speaker. The forces, changes, trends and technologies that are in play here are global, so the impact is even greater than our Nation's $11 trillion economy, and the changes run deep. We need to look at changes that have impacted our country and our economy over the last century, and particularly over the last two decades, the last 20 years. These changes over the last two decades are key to this story. The hamburger-flipping jobs argument is basically a way of saying that the changes in our economy mean things are getting worse or will get worse for most Americans. But in fact, Mr. Speaker, things are getting much better, and they promise to get even better for America in the future. This is an economy that is increasingly based on skilled workers. We do have a more global economy with complex business, trade, transportation, communications, and cultural links. We have new technologies making their way into so many aspects of our lives, and mostly in ways that are very, very good. By and large, these forces are working together in ways that are making the American economy work better in 2004 than it did 2 decades ago back in 1984. Now, I am using the term ``economy'' in the broadest sense, because each of these factors, services, skilled workers, globalization, trade, transportation, communications, and technology, is dramatically changing the way Americans do the things that make up our lives: work, shop, go to school, go to the doctor, be entertained, and have fun. In short, the people who claim that we are creating a hamburger-flipping jobs economy are asking us to turn back the clock on the past 20 years of change. Now, every change has not been good, obviously, and even the good changes that we have undergone on an overall basis have not been good for everyone. But I think we are clearly on the path to a better future, and dramatic course changes at this point could be very, very bad; would, in fact, I believe, be very bad for Americans. Now, Mr. Speaker, we have been talking about 20 years of change. I have not been talking about it just by accident. In fact, one of the reasons why I am here is that I believe we are now 20 years into a profound and dramatic period of economic change in America. One of the most striking things about the hamburger-flipping jobs buzzword is all the concepts it embodies. Those concepts have been around for a long time. It is basically a political and economic urban myth listening to that term: hamburger-flipping jobs. When I listen to different politicians talk about hamburger-flipping jobs and what they see as a declining economy, I swear that I have had a flashback to 1984. The spirit of the rhetoric, the basis of the ideas, the sense of foreboding, and being on the wrong economic track reminds me of Walter Mondale's run for President in 1984. Now, I have recently gotten my hands on his nomination speech before the Democratic Convention in that year. It is a remarkable read, Mr. Speaker, and not because it stirs the soul. It is remarkable to see in such explicit detail the platform on which Mr. Mondale ran for President back in 1984. He said that taxes were too low, the deficit was going to destroy our economy, we needed to adopt a nuclear freeze and negotiate annually with the Soviet Union. These were the big issues of his campaign back in 1984; and as we all know, he was, thank God, trounced by Ronald Reagan. Walter Mondale did not actually use the term ``hamburger-flipping jobs,'' but he said a few things that show that in 1984, the Democratic Party standard was firmly entrenched, deeply tied to that intellectual camp believing that hamburger-flipping jobs as a pejorative were the wave of the future. Speaking of the Reagan administration, the candidate Walter Mondale said, ``They crimped our future. They let us be routed in international competition, and now the help wanted ads are full of listings for executives and for dish washers, but not much in between.'' He did not quite say hamburger-flipping jobs, Mr. Speaker, but there it is, the claim that most of the jobs that were being created were for dish washers. He went on to say, ``When the American economy leads the world, jobs are here, the prosperity is here for our children. But that is not what is happening today. This is the worst trade year in American history. Three million of our best jobs have gone overseas.'' Again, that is Walter Mondale talking in 1984 about where we stood. He said, ``It has been devastating, the worst trade year in American history. Three million of our best jobs have gone overseas.'' And as if Walter Mondale had a vision of 2004 and the fact that leading American companies are investing in facilities in places like China, India, Europe, and Mexico, creating new jobs in those new countries, Mondale said, ``To big companies that send our jobs overseas, my message is, we need those jobs here at home, and our country won't help your business unless your business helps our country.'' That was Walter Mondale in 1984. Now, this certainly sounds a lot like the political rhetoric regarding Benedict Arnold CEOs that we hear today. We also did some research, Mr. Speaker, to find the earliest reference that we could come up with to the term hamburger-flipping jobs, and lo and behold it was in 1984. We found an article in the New York Times that was basically about this very same issue: the concern that good American manufacturing jobs were disappearing, often moving overseas and being replaced by low-paying service jobs, the dreaded hamburger-flipping jobs. At this point, Mr. Speaker, I would include in the Record an article in the New York Times which I am going to talk about. [From the New York Times, Sept. 4, 1984] ``High Tech,'' Narrated by Walter Cronkite (By Steven Greenhouse) It is late afternoon at the Fanuc Limited factory at the foot of Mount Fuji in Japan, and not a worker is in sight-- not a human one at least. The huge metallic arm of a robot swivels around and places a small mechanical part into the machine it is building. In this way, Fanuc's robot-filled, computer-controlled factory can run eight-hour shifts without anyone working inside. That's the haunting opening scene from the probing hour- long CBS documentary, ``High Tech: Dream or Nightmare?'' which is to be aired tonight at 8. In narrating this timely documentary, Walter Cronkite makes clear that these 21st- century manufacturing techniques are a boon to productivity. With robots replacing people, there's little need to worry about absenteeism, alcoholism, strikes, shoddy workmanship or overtime pay. However, Mr. Cronkite questions just how good this brave new manufacturing world is for the nation's workers. By forcing dozens of aging factories to be closed and thousands of workers to be thrown out of their jobs, robots and other high-tech production techniques have created what Mr. Cronkite called ``the blue-collar blues.'' Indeed, one expert interviewed predicts that technological change alone will cause a shortfall of six million jobs for American workers by 1990. The show addresses several of the key issues facing the United States as it embarks upon another industrial revolution: What is going to happen to the hundreds of thousands of workers whose jobs are taken away by machines? By destroying many high-paying factory jobs, are high-tech production techniques going to turn the United States into a nation of $50,000-a-year systems managers and $3.50-an-hour janitors and hamburger flippers? In other words, is high tech going to polarize the United States and cause its great middle class to disappear? Mr. Cronkite also examines an important corollary economic question: How healthy is the nation's shift from a manufacturing economy to a service one? He asks whether this shift is going on faster than it naturally would--or should-- as a result of imports from countries that heavily subsidize their industries or pay one-tenth the wages of what American companies pay. The cameras also look at the unevenness of the nation's recovery. Thriving Silicon Valley is contrasted with ailing Rust Bowl cities like Cleveland and Youngstown, Ohio, which one expert described as ``Manufacturing Appalachias.'' Mr. Cronkite interviews Lee A. Iacocca, Chrysler's dynamic chairman, who says the nation should be doing more to preserve its ailing manufacturing base. ``You can't just have video arcades and drive-in banks and hamburger joints,'' Mr. Iacocca says. None of the workers or economists interviewed takes a Luddite view suggesting that high tech be scrapped because it throws workers out of jobs. But they caution that unions may vigorously oppose the introduction of robots--Mr. Cronkite calls them ``steel-collar workers''--if blue-collar workers are merely victims of high-tech, if they do not share in the benefits resulting from high-tech's more efficient production techniques. ``I think the real issue is the social cost of the change-- who pays for it, how it's paid,'' said Harley Shaiken, a technology expert at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Mr. Iacocca suggests that government, labor and management should undertake a massive retraining program to salvage the lives of 45-year-old workers laid off at Youngstown's steel mills and Detroit's assembly plants. Mr. Shaiken proposes government assistance to help the jobless move to areas where jobs are abundant. And Thomas R. Donahue, the secretary- treasurer of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., suggests a shorter work week to help spread the jobs that remain. The documentary is more cerebral, more theoretical than most. It is long on interviews--most of them excellent--with experts such as economists, corporate executives and robotics pioneers. At the same time, the show is short on interviews with workers whose lives have been turned topsy-turvy by technology. One or two detailed interviews with these victims of technology would have made the show more compelling. The documentary is at its most interesting when is shows how the antiseptic new high-tech factories operate. An enjoyable and informative takeoff on Chaplin's ``Modern Times'' was a speeded-up sequence showing the construction of a jumbo jet in Boeing's highly automated factory. The camera work in that sequence and many others is superb. By zooming in on computer screens, for example, the photographer helps make some of these difficult new technologies comprehensible. In addition, the camera conveys the eerie, often alienating qualities of these technologies. At the program's conclusion, Mr. Cronkite asks what is going to happen to the workers of the 1990's--that is to say, to children now in school. He wonders whether high tech will provide enough jobs to match what will presumably be their impressive skills and education. That, however, may be the stuff of another documentary. Mr. Speaker, the article that I talk about is a news analysis of the probing hour-long PBS documentary that was entitled ``High-Tech: Dream or Nightmare?'' Again, this is back in 1984. It was an article about a television documentary by then the Nation's leading TV personality, Walter Cronkite. Remember, this was 20 years ago, 1984, the very early days of cable, before satellite television. The networks were really king and spoke to a majority of the American people. The New York Times describes the haunting opening scene of the documentary: a robot-filled, computer-controlled Japanese factory. No human workers in sight. The article reads, ``Walter Cronkite makes clear that these 21st century manufacturing techniques are a boon to productivity. ``However, Mr. Cronkite questions just how good this brave new manufacturing world is for our Nation's workers. By forcing dozens of aging factories to be closed and thousands of workers to be thrown out of their jobs, robots and other high-tech production techniques have created what Mr. Cronkite called `the blue-collar blues.' Indeed, one expert interviewed predicts that technological change alone will cause a shortfall of 6 million jobs for American workers by 1990.'' Again, this was a New York Times piece in 1984 giving an account of the Walter Cronkite documentary. It goes on to ask, ``What is going to happen to the hundreds of thousands of workers whose jobs are taken away by machines? By destroying many high-paying factory jobs, are high-tech production techniques going to turn the United States into a Nation of $50,000-a- year systems managers and $3.50 an hour janitors'' and, yes, Mr. Speaker, ``hamburger-flippers?'' As I have said, hamburger-flippers is the buzzword for the very, very negative service economy, and we see it used that way back there in 1984. I quote again, Mr. Speaker: ``Mr. Cronkite also examines an important corollary economic question: How healthy is the Nation's shift from a manufacturing economy to a service one?'' Again, that is 1984, the New York Times reporting on the Walter Cronkite documentary. Now, Mr. Speaker, Lee Iacocca, referred to in this article as Chrysler's dynamic chairman, was always better at turning a phrase than most. He argued in the piece that the country needed to protect its manufacturing base saying, ``You can't just have video arcades and drive-in banks and hamburger joints.'' That kind of argument, Mr. Speaker, has a timeless feel to it. We heard a lot of it in 2003, and we will continue to hear a lot of it in 2004. It is just so amazing that we go back and hear the exact same thing having been said 20 years ago. I believe that stepping back and looking at this issue over a longer time frame like this 20 years is actually very important for us to understand just how mistaken and how really dangerous the hamburger- flipping analysis that was offered in 1984 and is being offered in 2004 is, and that Cronkite documentary and the New York Times were right when they said massive changes were under way in America. The U.S. was entering a period of profound economic and technological change. To say it was the dawn of a new industrial revolution probably is not the best choice of words, because the fundamental change in the economy was the shift from the heavy industry-based economy of the middle 20th century to the more technologically and skill-based new economy of these past 20 years, from 1984 to 2004. It is not easy to describe the new economy, Mr. Speaker; but some aspects are very clear. It used more communication technologies to connect people from all corners of the world. Information technology, digital technology, and the Internet exploded during that 20-year period. It was faster. Business adopted just-in-time production schedules that relied on very precise planning and transportation models, and there was a lot of change. That was true for business, and it was true for people as well. I want to focus on this last concept first, namely, change. The new economy, some call it the service economy, but I think a better name for it is the 21st century economy. It meant a lot of change, and change that has happened very quickly. To give an example, the pace of economic change in the past 20 years compared to the preceding era of economic stability, which I would say ended up in a period of stagnation; I looked at the list of companies in the Dow Jones industrial average. The Dow Jones has compiled an average of the stock prices of a select handful of the Nation's leading businesses since 1884, and it is intended to reflect the market generally, the Dow 30. Now, from 1963 to 1983, the Dow Jones average included 30 companies. Over those 20 years, 26 of the 30 companies were the exact same. Only four dropped off and were replaced by new companies. Now, that is obviously stability that we saw from 1963 to 1983; and for the most part, during that period of time it was good, it was comfortable, and it was stable. The 26 companies, Mr. Speaker, that stayed the same through the entire 20-year period are Allied Chemical, Aluminum Company of America, American Can, AT&T, American Tobacco, Bethlehem Steel, DuPont, Eastman Kodak, Exxon, General Electric, General Foods, General Motors, Goodyear, Inco, International Harvester, International Paper Company, Proctor and Gamble, Owens-Illinois Glass, Sears Roebuck, Standard Oil of California, Texaco, Union Carbide, United Technologies, U.S. Steel, Westinghouse, and Woolworth. Those were 26 of the 30 companies that remained constant during that 2-decade period from 1963 to 1983. Of course, by the mid 1970s, the economy was not performing well, to say the least. I will discuss that more later. But as I said, the line between comfortable stability and very uncomfortable stagnation can be quite thin. Looking at the Dow Jones Industrial Average over the period of transition into this 21st century economy, that is, the past 20 years, shows a very, very different picture. From 1984 to 2004, there was a remarkable turnover of 16 new corporate faces among the 30 included in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, those 30 businesses. Today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average's 30 includes the following companies: 3M, Alcoa, Altria Group, American Express, AT&T, Boeing, Caterpillar, Citigroup, CocaCola, DuPont, Eastman Kodak, Exxon, Mobile, General Electric, General Motors, Hewlett-Packard, Home Depot, Honeywell, Intel, IBM, International Paper, Johnson & Johnson, J.P. Morgan Chase, McDonald's, Merck, Microsoft, Proctor and Gamble, SBC Communications, United Technologies, Wal-Mart, and Disney. The new companies read like a Who's Who of the economy of today, including Boeing, Citigroup, Hewlett-Packard, Home Depot, Intel, Johnson and Johnson, JP Morgan, Microsoft, SBC, Wal-Mart and Disney. This list may be the most succinct way to respond to the hamburger flipping jobs argument, Mr. Speaker. The new economy, the service economy, the 21st century economy, the changes in the American economy over the past 20 years have seen the rise of these new corporate giants and the industries and technologies they represent. They represent the revolution in computer software and hardware, the revolution in telecommunications, the revolution in global finance, the global entertainment business, the revolution in retail, distribution and supply management. They are now key faces in the American economy. Those companies that survived, those that were there throughout the last 20 years, like AT&T, General Electric, General Motors, Eastman Kodak, Exxon, IBM and Proctor & Gamble, all adopted those same technologies and techniques to make themselves 21st century economy leaders. In other words, change swept through those companies even when the names stay the same. Change is scary, I will acknowledge that, Mr. Speaker. It is scary for businesses, and businesses are not actually alive. Businesses are really just organizations of people, and we all know that change is scary for people. Change often leads to uncertainty and confusion, at least temporarily, and even when it is not affecting some directly, it does create anxiety. No doubt about it, the 21st century economy has brought change and anxiety. Tracking the early history of the hamburger flipping job political urban myth, I came across another absolutely striking article from the New York Times. This article was just 2 years after the previous one that I mentioned. This one was written in 1986. In terms of our 20-year time frame, this was still basically the start of this process of moving towards the 21st century economy. The article is entitled The Average Guy Takes It on the Chin. It is by Steven Greenhouse. He authored the article that I quoted from earlier about Walter Cronkite's documentary, and it is a rhetorical precursor to the message of the two Americas that we are hearing about today in this Presidential campaign. This article from 1986 begins: ``For millions of breadwinners, the American dream is becoming the impossible dream. Even the most basic tenet of the dream, that a young family will be more prosperous in its middle age, has grown more elusive. The statistics tell the harsh story of Americans struggling just to stay in place economically.'' Obviously this was not a good news piece written back in 1986. It tells the story, which was very real in that year, of the economic stagnation that struck this country in the 1970s, which culminated with the wrenching economic downturn that we saw in the early 1980s. Well, the economy began to grow in 1983. It was entering the period of profound change that I have talked about, and the eventual outcomes were not clear obviously at that point. Frank S. Levy, a professor of public policy at the University of Maryland, is quoted as saying, ``From the end of World War II to 1973, everybody was getting better off, but from 1973 through now,'' that was 1986, ``that has stopped,'' he said. The article goes on to say, ``Economists generally agree that the only way workers can manage to make substantial strides in real earnings during the years ahead is through steady and strong productivity growth, which very few economists are predicting now.'' And it says, ``Many economists point out that other countries such as Japan and West Germany have achieved higher growth in productivity. Some even suggest that the United States may be starting to undergo the same wrenching economic decline that the British have experienced in recent decades.'' Now, remember again, this was written in 1986, Mr. Speaker. I mention that quote because at the beginning of this past 20 years, there was a very real concern, fear some would say, that foreign countries like Japan and West Germany were more productive and were more successful. They would dominate the 21st century economy. In fact, many here in this Congress at that time, I remember very vividly standing here listening to those who would argue that we had to model the U.S. economy after the economies of Japan and Germany, their industrial planning models. Now, Mr. Speaker, of course, jobs are key, and the prospect that they will be scarce does breed anxiety. Again, this 1986 New York Times article goes on to say, ``As young workers enter the job market, many can find only low-paid jobs in the service sector.'' It goes on to quote Sandra Shaber of Chase Econometrics who said, ``For every 25- year-old I read about making $300,000 on Wall Street, there are hundreds of 25-year-olds working as fast-food people or hospital orderlies earning $3.50 an hour.'' Now, there it is, Mr. Speaker, the vision of the service economy, meaning one well-paid Wall Street success story and hundreds of 25- year-olds working in fast-food chains and cleaning bedpans. In my view, the New York Times article obviously failed in predicting the future, but it actually did an excellent job in summarizing the recent economic history up to that point back in 1986. The problem was slow productivity. They were right on target. The article highlights, ``When asked the reason for lagging income growth, economists speak with rare unanimity: Slow productivity is Public Enemy No. 1,'' these economists said back in 1986. It goes on to quote Audrey Freeman, executive director of the Conference Board. She said, ``In the long term, the only way to get wages to increase without inflation is to increase productivity, but we haven't been doing very well in that department.'' Again, that was said in 1986, portending the future. The fundamental problem was productivity. They got that right, Mr. Speaker, but the economists in this article got just about everything else dead wrong. Here is what they had to say about the ongoing transition to more services in the economy. They said, ``As the Nation's economy moves from manufacturing to services, the productivity problem compounds. It is generally easier to turn out more widgets per hour than to squeeze more hourly output from lawyers, travel agents or hamburger flippers.'' Not to belabor the point, but I would quote again from the article, ``The experts are not optimistic about the outlook for productivity growth. `I really don't see productivity growth coming back to the 3 percent levels that we had in the 1950s,' said Douglas P. Handler, a productivity specialist with Wharton Econometrics.' And, `There is very little on the horizon that would cause us to be optimistic about productivity improvements over the remainder of this decade.''' Again, this was written in 1986, 18 years ago at the beginning of this move that started 20 years ago towards this 21st century economy. Finally, I cannot pass on the fact that the author goes out of his way to point out that the one group of people that is not able to see how bad things were in the American economy in 1986 were the American people. In the face of all the economists in the article, the author notes, ``Nonetheless, households are stubbornly refusing to change their spending habits. And spirits, despite the grim income statistics, remain high. According to the University of Michigan Survey Research Center, consumer confidence is far higher than it was during the recent times of double-digit inflation, interest rates and unemployment.'' Well, Mr. Speaker, this article is a great example of the kind of anxiety about technology replacing jobs and service jobs being bad, foreign countries like Japan being better prepared for the economy of the future than America, and productivity being dead in the water with no hope in sight. As I said, this article was from 1986, nearly 20 years ago, but if you listen to the political debate today in 2004, you hear many of the exact same themes: Technology threatens jobs, losing jobs to lower-cost foreign competitors. You can almost take every reference to Japan and simply change the country name to China, and you get a tangible sense that the future is not good. I am not going to go chapter and verse through all the doom and gloom predictions and warnings of those who think that America and its people are actually threatened by the 21st century economy. We do not have the time to do that, and it is obvious to those who have been listening to this national debate over the years, whether the issue was trade with Mexico, the creation of the global trade rules of the WTO, trade with China, or the recent bursting of the Internet bubble. Instead, let us remember that 20 years is a pretty long time. Yes, we hear many of the same concerns in 2004 that were voiced in the late 1980s, but we can now judge how accurate, how sensible, how thoughtful those concerns were 20 years ago. In fact, I believe that we can look at how things played out over the past 20 years, the dire predictions and the reality, and learn a thing or two about how the similar line of thinking would impact our future going forward. So did America turn into a Nation of a few $50,000-a-year systems managers and an army of $3.50-an-hour janitors and hamburger flippers, a handful of Wall Street wizards lording it over a middle America of fast-food servers and hospital orderlies? Did the American dream become the impossible dream? Remember, we are no longer in the world of economic or academic theory when we answer these questions. For a moment, we do not need projections from the Conference Board, Chase Econometrics or Wharton Econometrics. We have just lived these 20 years from 1984 to 2004. Did the American dream die over the last 20 years? For nearly all Americans, nearly all Americans, the answer is a resounding no. Did Japan take over the global economy as was predicted? The answer, an obvious no. Did U.S. jobs decrease? Another obvious no. Over those 20 years, over those 20 years the U.S. economy put 40 million people to work, and pay was up. Did incomes fall? No. Pay and real incomes increased. As I said earlier, the forces that ended up shaping our economy over those 20 years actually impacted just about every aspect of our lives, your lives, Mr. Speaker. A focus on better services, more skilled workers, more global integration, more international trade, better transportation, revolutions in communications and technology, they impacted every corner of life here in America. So let us take a moment to take a broader look, step back and think about the big activities in our economy and in your life. Are you consuming more or less? For most people the answer is a lot more, and, remarkably, much of the stuff we buy is relatively less expensive and usually more technologically advanced than it was 20 years ago. Is your television set bigger? Almost certainly. Do you have more choice in what you watch? I am from Los Angeles, so I am biased about the quality, but say what you will about the products of the American entertainment industry, there are many, many more choices available to viewers in 2004 than there were in 1984. Do you have a computer in your home today, and did you back in 1984? Do you use the Internet? Do you communicate with friends and family over e-mail? Do you go on line to check the weather forecast or movie times, or shop for something that is hard to find, or hear about sales at your favorite stores? You did not do any of those things 20 years ago, Mr. Speaker. Did you have a cell phone 20 years ago? Again, this is an easy one. You probably do today, and almost certainly did not 20 years ago. Many millions of Americans feel better because they have their cell phones with them and can contact family and friends in a pinch. Do you travel more? Fly more? Are you driving a better car than you did in 1984? The answer to all of those questions is almost certainly yes, as automakers have stretched themselves to the brink putting new technologies into cars that get better mileage, break down less, are safer, are environmentally cleaner and are packed with technology. Think about the times you had to take your automobile back to the shop 20 years ago juxtaposed to today. The kind of technology that is packed into the cheapest car in 2004 was considered to be cutting-edge technology in 1984. Has health care improved? Now, people are concerned about health care costs, obviously. And now is not the time to go into that debate. We talk about it regularly around here. But, clearly, since 1984, the number of new treatments and improvements in new technologies have been staggering. We can and will debate about how to pay for it all, but there is no denying that health care in America has taken a huge leap forward, and I am convinced that we are now on the brink of a new biotechnology revolution. Is education improving? Again, education is never good enough, but we have made great strides in education since the middle 1980s. We could go on all day thinking about how things have changed over the last 20 years, but it is clear they have changed a lot. The U.S. economy is turning out bigger, better, and more advanced products and services. There is no question that the doom and gloom predictions of 20 years ago proved to be way off the mark. Contrary to the Mondale prediction of 1984, the U.S. economy did not crash and burn. So did the service sector slow U.S. productivity growth, as was outlined in that Steven Greenhouse article in the New York Times in 1986? The answer: a resounding no. Did most twenty-somethings end up working in fast food and other low-skilled jobs while a few made it big? The answer is no. Did computers and robots replace millions of workers and leave them unemployed or flipping hamburgers? The answer is no. But that is actually a complicated issue that we need to get into in greater detail. Now, Mr. Speaker, if we want to know the why behind the fact that 20 years ago there were predictions of doom and gloom and then those 20 years ended up resulting in such great strides, we need to look at the core economic question. That question is: Did American productivity go up? The answer is, yes, it went up dramatically. In fact, productivity has been going up so rapidly, and we have all heard this recently, some people now think that the problem is not productivity; they think it is now a jobs problem. Remember that scary New York Times piece in 1986? ``The Average Guy Takes It on the Chin,'' was the title of the article. Greenhouse and his gaggle of economists and productivity experts pointed out that increasing productivity was key to the future. They were right in 1986 when they said that productivity was key to the future. The thing they got wrong was their prediction of doom and gloom. They missed the productivity revolution that was emerging then and there right before their eyes. They predicted the hamburger-flipping jobs future. In 1986, that was excusable, because predicting the future is tough. I know, because I am sorry to say I did not buy Microsoft, Intel, and Cisco stock back in the mid-1980s. But some people still serve up the same ideas that we heard in 1984. It is like they were locked in a time capsule for the past 2 decades and missed the massive economic changes that have occurred. The fact is, Mr. Speaker, something happened to American businesses on the way to the hamburger-flipping future, or, more accurately, a number of things happened. As I mentioned earlier, American business underwent a revolution in computer software and hardware, a revolution in telecommunications, a revolution in banking and finance, a revolution in transportation and delivery, and a revolution in retail distribution and supply management. We saw companies like Citigroup, Hewlett-Packard, Home Depot, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, JP Morgan Chase, Microsoft, SBC, Wal-Mart, and Disney become part of the corporate elite. Overnight and express delivery services exploded. The Internet became a place of business with eBay, Yahoo!, Amazon and Google getting started back then. Just as important as those success stories is the fact that the revolutionary business practices and technologies infiltrated just about every level of American economic life. The corporate dynasties that survived the past 20 years, AT&T, GE, General Motors, Eastman Kodak, Exxon, IBM, and Proctor and Gamble, remade themselves into 21st century economic leaders. American small business remade itself as well. Computers, cell phones, pagers, credit cards and scanners are part of nearly every business in America today, even very small businesses. Does your dry cleaner take credit cards? Does your auto mechanic have a diagnostic computer to check your car? The buzzwords for business and the economy of the last 20 years are concepts and strategies like supply chain management, just-in-time delivery, distribution centers, information management, customer relations, forecasting and planning. It is about adding value to the raw materials and basic goods. To businesses, the result was a massive jump in their ability to serve their customers better. And I do not just mean customers like you and me, but business customers too. The ability to harness technologies that improved planning, customer service, and communications created jumps in productivity and efficiency. To customers, whether the customer is General Motors being served by a parts supplier or a family being served by Wal-Mart, the result has been greater choices and lower prices. I am going to repeat something here: the ability to harness the new technologies, use technologies, those technologies created the increased productivity and efficiency. That is the key here, because machines do not harness technology, Mr. Speaker, people do. And that is why people, millions and millions of smart, skilled, hardworking Americans have been at the heart of the revolution of the 21st century economy. Again, in our search for a suitable buzzword, the ``services economy'' really does not do it. It is a ``business serving customers economy.'' Still not catchy, but business serving customers is really more accurate. We do have a service economy. Providing a service of some kind to someone represents 65 percent of everything produced in America, and those services account for over 80 percent of U.S. jobs. The 20-year- old predictions that the service economy would be based on hamburger- flipping jobs or dish washers, lawn workers, and retail salespeople clearly missed the mark. We have lived through the 20 years creating this 21st century economy. We are in the Internet Age, the 500-channel, 50-inch-TV age, the prices-are-falling-at-Wal-Mart age. This is not the hamburger-flipping economy. Mr. Speaker, jobs concern people. Mom and pop always want their kids to be able to get a decent job, if for no other reason so that they do not have to keep supporting them. That was at the heart of family anxiety in 1984 and 1986, and that will remain the biggest economic question in 2004 and 2006. And we lived through the Internet bubble in the late 1990s. We know that every boy and girl in America is not going to be a Silicon Valley multimillion dollar entrepreneur or biotechnology engineer. Mom and pop are practical enough to understand that. But that is not the problem. The important question is what are the 21st century economy jobs going to be? What will Jimmy and Nicole be doing in 6 years? The fact is that they, like most American workers, will be in the business of serving someone tomorrow, next year, and in 2010. Of course there will still be fast-food jobs, retail jobs, lawn care, janitorial, and house-cleaning jobs. There will be construction jobs. There always will be. And as the number of people in America grows, and we are approaching 300 million Americans in this great land of ours, the number of those jobs will grow. But our economy created 40 million new jobs over the past 20 years. Forty million jobs since the birth of the argument that the service economy meant nothing more than hamburger-flipping jobs. So let us get down to brass tacks. What kinds of jobs are the American people doing in the 21st century economy? And I am going to go through this litany here, Mr. Speaker. Network and communications administration, business administration and management, computer engineering technology, electronics engineering technology for all the machines that are not computers, health information technology, legal support, accounting, marketing, advertising, customer relations, news and information reporting, tax preparation and planning, highly specialized transportation and delivery, human resources support, pension and benefits management, purchasing and global sourcing, demand forecasting, inventory control, warehousing, and distribution. Now, Mr. Speaker, these are not CEO jobs. They are not get-rich-quick jobs. But they are good jobs using very valuable skills. They are service jobs that are a part of just about every kind of business in America today. They are not Bill Gates, and they are not hamburger- flipping jobs. Think about the big and growing sectors of our economy. Think about what you spend your money on, Mr. Speaker: health care; biotechnology and pharmaceuticals; elderly care; education; movies, entertainment and digital gaming; recreation; telecommunications, cable, satellite TV and radio, phones, cellular and wireless networks; fashion; insurance; real estate; autos, maintenance and repair; mass transit; investments, whether you call it the stock market, pensions, or securities. We all know that more than half the American people are members of the investment class, as many as six in 10. Government services, which is, as we all know, almost unimaginably big. Leisure, hospitality, and tourism. Then there are the businesses that serve other businesses: engineering, environmental protection services and technologies, risk management, export and import financing, express delivery, high-tech manufacturing, and biomedical informatics. Mr. Speaker, the 21st century economy, the business serving customers economy, is based on all of these things. Not robots, robot technicians, and a bunch of fast-food workers and lawn workers. As we have made the transition of the past 20 years, more than half of all service jobs and a large majority of new service jobs paid above the average wage. And as I said earlier, low-paying hamburger-flipping, retail and janitorial jobs continue to grow as our population grows, but executive and professional jobs are growing much, much faster. If the American economy of the past 20 years, this new 21st century economy that has revolutionized the way businesses serve their customers, is so great a success, why is any of this an issue? How can somebody in 2004 say that we are becoming an economy of hamburger- flipping jobs and not be ridiculed and laughed off the national stage? A big part of the answer is that our economy has been undergoing a big long transition, which is the 20-year story, but we live day to day and year to year in an economy where things get better or worse. In economic terms, we have trends, which are the long-term big picture, and cycles, which are shorter term. The trends can last a couple of decades, even the better part of a century. The cycles are business cycles that last a couple of years or maybe one decade. Most economists, or at least economic historians, would agree that our Nation's economic history has been dominated by the Industrial Revolution and the creation of the global industrial economy. We had a largely agrarian economy when our country was born. America then underwent a long transition, a transformation, really, to being the world's leading heavy industrial economy. That long economic transition took up the bulk of our Nation's history. It was well under way by the 1840s and probably climaxed in the 1960s. Big historical trends rarely have bright-line starting and stopping points. Politics and history can work that way with elections, assassinations, wars and treaties providing clear historical dates to look back on. Economic change is different, Mr. Speaker. Even big dates, 1929 and the stock market crash or 1930 and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, are really not that significant when looking at big trends. The big economic trends in the first part of our Nation's history was the transition from the agrarian economy to the industrial economy. That was a transition that probably took 100 years. There was no single point where 1 day, or 1 year, America had an agrarian economy, and the next year it was industrialized. And single events were not that important. Instead, the spread of increasingly heavy machines, in early factories, railroads, and on farms, were key. And technologies always take time to go from invention to standardization and widespread use. Mr. Speaker, we are now clearly in the second transition. Heavy industry is no longer the king of the American economy. Instead, businesses, large and small, are harnessing technologies and skilled workers to create an economy based more on providing better service to customers than on the specific product itself. This has been going on for 20 years now. Twenty years happens to coincide with the birth of that political urban myth where everyone ends up with a hamburger flipping job. Over those 20 years, jobs are way up, incomes are way up, and technological improvements are spreading throughout our lives. Very few Americans would take the 1984 life-style outlook that they had over the 2004 life-style, but we have had business cycles over those 20 years as well. We have had years of booming growth, we have had years of slow growth. We have had two actual recessions when the economy shrank. We have had lean times that did not fit the academic test of a recession, but certainly felt like a weak economy. In the midst of any one of those lean times, the fact that the economic trend over the previous decade was very good really did not matter much. Things were worse than the year before or the year before that. In addition, during the first part of the current 20-year economic growth trend, time had not passed enough to tell the difference between a trend and a cycle. The start of a trend can look a lot like the upside of a cycle. The economic slowdown that began in 2000, the final year of the Clinton administration, was clearly the downside of the cycle that began in 1992, the final year of the Presidency of George H.W. Bush. In the past 20 years, we had at least two cycles, one ending in a recession in 1991, and the other in a recession in 2001. We are almost certainly into a third cycle with growth again picking up. The U.S. economy has been growing strongly for the past 2 years. It grew at a staggering 8.2 percent annual rate in the third quarter of last year, surpassing even the most optimistic projections and marking the strongest pace in nearly two decades, 20 years. Unemployment claims are dropping, and workers' wages and benefits have climbed in recent months. Family incomes are up. Consumer spending is up. Inflation is low. The housing sector has been very strong, and business productivity, as we all know, has been incredibly strong. At this point in the business cycle, the big economic issue has been jobs. Remember, in the short term, we are coming off of some years like 1999 and 2000 where unemployment reached such low levels that most economists could not imagine numbers so low. In that context when the recession and slowdown in 2001 resulted in 6 percent unemployment, it created real concern, especially among the recently unemployed, and that is understandable. Politics reacts far more to the short-term cycle than the long-term trend, so it is easy to see why everyone is talking about the struggles of recent years rather than the incredibly good news of the last 20 years. But as we deal with the political realities of the short term, we must not lose sight of the big picture. The hamburger flipping job argument is not just false, it is actually a dangerous thing. Twenty years ago this kind of rhetoric did not get the chance to hurt our economy because hard-working and innovative Americans kept right on forging new technologies, revolutionizing what businesses do and how they do it, and improving the way Americans go about living their lives. But today, thanks to the short-term business cycle we are coming out of, the hamburger flipping argument resonates with a lot of people, and it is resulting in some very misguided and dangerous proposals. It is generating calls for protectionism, calls for policies that stifle the very environment that has allowed skilled American workers to harness new technologies and bring about our booming 21st century economy. Mr. Speaker, attempts to undermine the principles that are the foundation of this economy threaten the progress and prosperity that has come about over these two decades. That is why debunking the hamburger flipping argument once and for all is not just critical to understanding the good news of the last 20 years, it is essential to ensuring that our future remains bright as well.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that it shall be in order at any time without intervention of any point of order to consider in the House H.R. 2751; the bill shall be considered as read for amendment; the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on Government Reform now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted; all points of order against the bill, as amended, are waived; and the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, to final passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate on the bill, as amended, equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Government Reform; and (2) one motion to recommit with or without instructions.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, the Committee on Rules may meet the week of February 9 to grant a rule which could limit the amendment process for floor consideration of H.R. 1561, the United States Patent and Trademark Fee Modernization Act of 2003. The Committee on the Judiciary ordered the bill reported on July 9, 2003, and filed its report with the House on July 25, 2003. Any Member wishing to offer an amendment should submit 55 copies of the amendment and one copy of a brief explanation of the amendment to the Rules Committee in room H-312 of the Capitol by 2 p.m. on Tuesday, February 10. Members should draft their amendment to the text of the bill as reported by the Committee on the Judiciary. Members should use the Office of Legislative Counsel to ensure that their amendments are drafted in the most appropriate format. Members are also advised to check with the Office of the Parliamentarian to be certain their amendments comply with the rules of the House.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. Let me first of all thank the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne) for his work on this very balanced measure that came forward from the committee chaired by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner). It is a bipartisan measure. I am convinced at the end of this day that this bill itself will enjoy bipartisan support; but I have been told, I have not followed the debate completely, but I have been told that a number of people have been raising concern about the fact that we are not giving the minority an opportunity to have a chance to discuss the issue of unemployment insurance. Well, I would ask rhetorically, what is it we are doing right now? Obviously, we are considering this measure under an open amendment process, allowing an opportunity for this issue to be addressed. Let me also say that as we look at the overall question of extending unemployment, it seems to me that we need to realize that during the Clinton administration, when we saw an unemployment rate at 6.4 percent in 1994, we saw an end to the benefits that we are talking about right here. In years past, a 6-percent level of unemployment has traditionally been considered full employment. Now obviously every single one of us is concerned about the fact that there are people in this country who are looking for a job, who have not been able to find a job. We want to do everything that we possibly can to encourage them. We want to do everything that we possibly can to help them. And, quite frankly, the Community Services Block Grant structure that is being put into place and extended through this legislation, I believe will go a long way towards providing assistance to those who truly are in need. But it is very clear, if you look historically at what a constant, blind extension of unemployment insurance often creates, it does in fact create a disincentive for many people who should be looking for job opportunities from doing just that. I happen to believe that as we look at this measure today, we are in a position where the proposal before us does not even go under the structure that has existed in the past for unemployment insurance. This notion of taking this issue and transferring it to the Department of Health and Human Services I believe is misplaced, and I believe that there should, in fact, be an opportunity for us to take a closer look at this. We are seeing very positive indicators of improved economic growth. Mr. Chairman, we are seeing very positive indications right now that good jobs are being created. Now, we know that the level has dropped from 6 percent down to 5.7 percent, again, many tenths of a percent below what it was in 1994 when we saw an end under the Clinton administration of these benefits being provided. But we also know that the gauge for determining unemployed is somewhat different. We need to look, I think along with the traditional level of job creation, we need to look at the Household Survey that is conducted by the Department of Labor. The Household Survey itself takes into consideration some very important factors: those who are self-employed. And, quite frankly, according to the Household Survey, since November of 2001 we have seen the creation of 1.9 million new jobs in this country. Now, I believe there are other steps that can be taken which will help create greater opportunity. The issue of global trade, I know, is a hotly debated and often controversial one. This administration and many of us in a bipartisan way in this Congress are working hard to try to pry open new markets for U.S. goods and services worldwide. I believe that will help us in our quest to address this issue of unemployment that is there. So we have a great opportunity to continue bold, strong, dynamic economic recovery. This amendment does not help us in that quest at all. Let me say that I do believe as we look at this issue going down the road, it will be very important for us to sustain the economic growth that is there today. And the establishment of a new program, the establishment of a new program will do nothing but hurt our quest to get this economy going. And so I thank, again, my friend for his leadership and yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, let me begin by thanking my very good friend, the former mayor of Charlotte, and I should say since I mentioned Charlotte, congratulations on a well-fought Super Bowl. I understand that in Charlotte there was no sense at all that anyone was a loser and it was a great game. She has done a superb job on managing this rule and with her work on the Committee on Rules. I am proud to be here. I have surmised from the comments from my good friend from Rochester that she is supportive of the rule. She did not indicate that, but I suspect that in light of the fact that with the exception of the preprinting requirement, this is an open amendment process and we have had one substitute that was outlined before our Committee on Rules yesterday and four amendments that have been filed that we will be able to have an opportunity for a free-flowing debate on a very important issue. I have to say that I am particularly proud of our colleague from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne) who has worked long and hard on this and gave great testimony before the Committee on Rules yesterday and understands very well that we are as a Nation seeing very positive signs of economic improvement. It used to be that the full employment rate in this country was 6 percent. I am happy to see the unemployment rate has dropped to 5.7 percent. We just got the report at the end of last week that the GDP growth for the fourth quarter of last year was at 4 percent, which is a very positive sign of improvement. Jobs are being created, contrary to a lot of the reports out there. Under the household survey which is conducted by the Department of Labor, we have seen 1.9 million new jobs created since November of 2001. So we are seeing positive signs out there, but the gentleman from Nebraska understands that there are still people out there who are in need and there are challenges. One of the things we want to do is make sure that we lay the groundwork, which is what the community services block grant program has done, lay the groundwork for people to move from depending on others to get to the productive side of our economy. We all know what that does. It not only plays a role in diminishing the reliance on taxpayer dollars but it also tremendously increases the self-esteem level. We have found that time and time again from a wide range of entities which work to help people who are facing dire circumstances get onto the productive side of the economy. It does wonders for their families and it creates a sense of optimism for the future. The gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne) and his work along with the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) and others understand that with the community services block grant, we can do a lot of very important things that do provide assistance to those who are truly in need. And so I simply want to congratulate the gentleman from Nebraska and congratulate all those who have been involved in putting this package together. We are going to have an interesting debate and I know that the substitute will spark a great deal of particular debate and interest. We will look forward to that. I hope very much that just as we, I believe, enjoy strong bipartisan support for this modified open rule, that we will similarly enjoy bipartisan support as has been anticipated on the passage of this legislation.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, to counter my friend, not in the area of football but on the issue of jobs, we all know that the economy is growing; but we continue to hear this argument that we are slow in the area of job growth. We have seen the report yesterday of a dramatic increase in consumer confidence, the highest levels since mid-2002. Obviously, productivity is at unprecedented levels. Investment is higher. Fifty percent of the American people are members of the investment class. And the market is over 10,600. So the interesting thing for us to note is that as we look at this job creation issue, it is important for us to observe that what we have regularly found is that the Department of Labor's payroll survey is the one that has been reporting not tremendous job growth. We must look at the household survey, which has shown that there have been 1.9 million new jobs created during this administration since November of 2001. It is important that while this rhetoric of jobless recovery is constantly put out there, the household survey takes into consideration something that the payroll survey does not, and that is the self-employed, those who are creating jobs in the private sector on their own. So it is important for us to responsibly look at these numbers, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding me this time, and I want to rise and join my colleagues, the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Science, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert), who very appropriately recognized the important contribution that Cornell University has made in this effort. And I should say that, even though I have been out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada/ Flintridge, the people in that town like to say that, as well as Pasadena. Pasadena and La Canada/Flintridge both claim the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. My friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), used to represent La Canada/Flintridge. He represents the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, and I am privileged to actually represent the facility of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is in La Canada/Flintridge. But as I am at JPL, I have to say to my friend from New York that I have regularly seen the pennants of Cornell University hanging in that facility. So Cornell has a very great presence; and as the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) said, Dr. Steven Squyers, who was the principal investigator, has in fact played a big role in recognizing the importance of Cornell to this project. The gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher), my colleague, I am happy to say was with us the night we were able to get images back, the night after the Mars exploratory rover Spirit landed, and has been a real visionary when it comes to the issue of space exploration. I also want to join in congratulating the former member of the Committee on Rules, the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Gordon), who is now, I am happy to say, the ranking minority member of not only the subcommittee that the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher) chairs but of the full Committee on Science; and of course my friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), who, as I said, did represent JPL and still continues with a very strong dedication to the science program and this great vision that is out there. The gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) gave a great outline of the history of the fascination that we as humans have had for outer space. I think that as we look at where we are going, it is amazing to see this debate which is raging on right now. I am somewhat saddened to hear some of my colleagues refer to the vision that the President set forth in his speech before the employees of NASA a week or so ago as being a joke. I know there are a lot of people who are very cynical about this whole notion of vigorously pursuing the goal of further pursuit of exploration in space, the Moon and Mars in particular. The reason I am discouraged about it is that I regularly look now into the eyes of young children who have this great fascination as they look towards the challenge of space exploration. One of the things that is particularly encouraging for me is that that same kind of fascination exists among many Members of Congress, not all but many Members of Congress, and it also exists today among every single one of those people who were named by the gentleman from California. Charles Elachi and the great team, Steve Squyres and Pete Theisinger and all those whom the gentleman from California mentioned continue to have that same fascination and they also have this amazing intellectual curiosity which has played such a big role in pursuing this. Mr. Speaker, it is impossible for us to describe in words the kind of excitement that has gone into this. The gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) and I have ridden the roller coaster ride. Four years ago last month, we saw the failure of the Mars polar lander. I had the opportunity to wait night after night at JPL to try and get some kind of message of a word back. Unfortunately we failed. But I am so often reminded of the words of Dr. Ed Stone, who was the predecessor of Director Charles Elachi, who said to me 4 years ago, this past month, ``David, if we don't take risks, we won't learn anything.'' That is really what this is all about, taking risks. As we rapidly approach the first anniversary of the tragic loss of those lives in the space shuttle Challenger, we can think about those seven men and women who lost their lives a year ago as we look at the great success that we are now experiencing with the Mars exploratory rover program. We have seen the successful landing and messaging coming back from Spirit. This coming weekend, I know my friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) will be in at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory as we see what I know we all hope and pray will be the same kind of success as we get messages back after seeing the successful landing on another part of the planet of the Mars exploratory rover named Opportunity. Spirit and Opportunity. The names of the two rovers in many ways is exactly what this is all about. There is one name of someone who was not mentioned by my friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), who I would like to point to as an individual who actually played a role in the first Viking program nearly 3 decades ago, in 1975 and 1976. He is an individual who was probably the youngest person who was involved in that program 30 years ago, and today he is probably, if not the oldest, one of the oldest involved in the Mars exploratory rover program. His name is Gentry Lee. He has a fascinating outline of what it has been like going from 1975 all the way up to today. Mr. Speaker, it is so clear that we have limitless opportunities as we look at space exploration. The kinds of tangible evidence that we have seen improving our quality of life continues to go on and on and we still do not know what kinds of opportunities we will find. One of the naysayers was on television the other day. He said in criticizing this program, if we had Mars covered with gold and we went to Mars to get this gold and bring it back, it would cost more to do that than the value of the gold itself. When we look at the imaging technology that has been created with MRIs, when we look at the cellular technology and the satellite telephones and the tremendous advances that have been made technologically not only in the health area but in the area of communications and security, we have transcended the cost of that gold, the value of that gold with what it is that we are doing here. And so, Mr. Speaker, I simply want to congratulate all of my colleagues who have been involved in this effort and I want to thank all who have joined as cosponsors of this resolution. I also want to include the appropriations subcommittee members who have been so important in this effort too, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Walsh) and the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Mollohan) who have been very helpful and have joined as cosponsors. I thank again my colleague from Huntington Beach for his leadership and his continued vision, and I hope very much that we are able to, in a bipartisan way, pursue the goals that have been set forth with President Bush's very dynamic plans for space exploration.

Mr. DREIER

Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I would respond to my friend by saying that I made it very clear in the record, when our friends were before the Committee on Rules, that I believe that it was wrong for us to proceed with consideration of the FAA conference report in the manner in which we did proceed with. And I said there, and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) has recognized here on the floor that I said, we will do everything possible to ensure that that does not happen again. And the majority leader, in the colloquy that he had with the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) later that week, made it clear that he also wanted to ensure that it would not happen again. I appreciate my friend for bringing that issue to the forefront.